News round up: Two dead as failing care home is shut down

According to medical charts one woman living at Southfield Care Home in Brackley, Northamptonshire was just given four sips of water in 24 hours and was not given morphine despite being in pain, it is claimed.

Inspectors from England’s care home watchdog, the Commission for Social Care Inspection, had already rated privately-run Southfield one of the worst in the country and made three unannounced spot checks last week.

They were so concerned about the safety of the 34 residents, mainly because of a lack of staff and their ability to give out medication, that they took out a court order to withdraw the home’s registration, forcing it to close immediately.

Teenagers are joining gangs in increasing numbers because they have no adult role model in their lives, the Prince’s Trust charity has cautioned.

In a bleak report on youth culture, the charity founded in 1976 by the Prince of Wales said that more than a third of 16 to 25-year-olds say they do not have a parent they consider a role model, so turn to their peer group instead.

The Conservatives today set out their credentials to become the champions of social equality in a document outlining the education gap between rich and poor, which they claim has widened under the Labour government.

The paper, entitled A Failed Generation, says English schoolchildren’s chances of getting good Sats results, GCSEs and A-levels is dictated by where they live.

About 55% of secondary schools in the 10% most deprived parts of the country are failing to reach the government’s floor target of 30% of pupils getting five good GCSEs, including English and maths. In comparison, just 3% of the schools are in the least deprived areas.

Too many women are being jailed for petty crimes and the Government must cut the number of female prison inmates, the justice minister has told The Independent.

The total of imprisoned women in England and Wales doubled in the past decade to 4,460. Maria Eagle, the justice minister, said too many vulnerable and mentally-ill female offenders are being locked up, and that the Government could achieve a “significant” cut of hundreds, to the point where some women’s prisons could be closed.

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